A Vibrant Autumn Glow

The remaining autumn leaves have become as vibrant as possible around here and those on the ground have mostly flown away by now. With today's 20-30 mph winds, I've definitely seen them flying! I photographed some trees and plants at the local park at just the moment when they were at their peak and before they flew away. 

How great are these leaves? This photo is actually my desktop wallpaper right now.

Stepping back a little, you can see those leaves on the shrub/mini tree next to the gazebo. The leaves looked almost electric at that time of day.

Here's a close-up view through the gazebo. Isn't that moss on the roof cool? I just noticed what I assume is a greened copper pipe under that roof.

What perfect late afternoon light! My favorite time to take outdoor photos is somewhere between 3:30 and 4:00 PM. I think you get the best balance of bright and warm light around that time. I was just thinking about how that might change with the seasons, but really 3:30-4:00 works best for me year-round. 

This area is the herb garden. Of course, it's more full of herbs in the summer. The hardy ones are still out now, though. Even with the garden somewhat died back, I think this area looks cool. The trees are adding a little drama at this stage of the year.

Here's "Autumn Snow" Candytuft, reminding me of a snowy owl.

And here you can see where the "snow" part comes in! It looks like snow falling from a cloud! And I suppose because this happens in autumn, it's "Autumn Snow".

There are several stone benches around the gardens, mostly in tribute or memorial to people. I especially liked the legs on this one. The plant theme is perfect for its location. This was the perfect time to be photographing stone designs as well as nature. All the details showed up in this light.

Tall, fluffy grasses in their seed stage:

This is one of my favorite photos of the day. I always enjoy a leaf on the walkway photo. 🍁🍂🍃

This tree is a "Katsura" and was donated to the park in 1957. It was already 38 years old at that point! Now obviously when I took this photo, it was a little late to observe its leaves. But I just read that in autumn, this tree's leaves give off a scent similar to candy corn. Maybe if I'm near this tree next September or October I'll give the leaves a sniff. 

You can just pretend you are walking along with me here.

Closer and closer... Do you see that metal lamp hanging up there? It's shaped like a flower. Those lamps do light up in the summer evenings. I just noticed what I think is a green gourd in the upper left?

And closer still. I love this picture. It's like a doorway to another world when you close in on the exit. And that doorway is absolutely glowing with the light on those leaves.

Isn't this park/garden beautiful in fall? I feel a little warmer just looking over these photos. 

I discovered some music on YouTube just now that I think is a perfect fit with these photos: Celtic Music & Autumn Forest Ambience  

If you play this while looking over the photos again, I think you'll find it relaxing. It would work especially well if you view the photos as a slideshow. I do that by clicking on the first photo to enlarge it and then going forward with the --> key. 

The Ghosts of Golden

Hey Everyone! We're back from our trip to Colorado and I think you'll be seeing about four blog posts from it! It was an action-packed, emotional trip and I'm really glad we made it.

The first night my mom and I were in Colorado, we stayed in a town called Golden. Golden is really old, and at one point (1861-1867) it was the capital of Colorado Territory! Golden was founded during the Pike's Peak Gold Rush in 1859. When I imagine downtown Golden in its prime mining town days, I imagine it being much busier than it is today. At least on the night we went it was quiet. I liked the vibe in the old section of town. We were clearly looking at buildings from the 1800s and it was night, but it didn't feel at all creepy there.

That's not to say that there aren't some ghosts. I did some research on Golden before going on this trip, because I figured with a place this old, there ought to be some ghost hanging around. The main haunted place I found people talking about was "The Buffalo Rose" which is a saloon and restaurant. I watched a video from a local Colorado news station about the place before going and it looked promising.

So, with the Buffalo Rose in mind, we headed out. Driving through the mountains in the dark was spooky in its way. It was definitely a different kind of view of nature at night for me.

We passed the Coors Brewery, which is interesting to me as a Milwaukeean. (Since Miller has merged with Coors). For my Mom who came from Colorado, it must seem like the perfect business partnership.

I took a number of blurry shots of the Coors Brewery. It was that twilight time when it's so hard to get a photo to turn out. Plus, I was in a moving car. But a few came out well enough.

Into town, I kept taking photos, in part because I wanted to get that 'M' on the mountain for the Colorado School of Mines. Also because I just take a lot of photos of random stuff. This turned out to be very helpful later on!

So, once in town we set out to find the Buffalo Rose. This is one of the first buildings we passed. It's like a cartoon building with eyes, hey?

Then we walked up to this one and BAM! It hit me with a ton of energy.

It's one of those buildings with a presence. It was a hotel, later a boarding and rooming house, and now serves as the town's Astor House Museum. It dates from 1867! Can you believe some dingbat wanted to tear this down to put up a parking lot? Come on. Luckily, the town rallied around it and then other buildings to make sure they were registered as historic places.

Do you feel like the building is looking back at you? If you do, I'd be curious to hear which window you feel that coming from.

Onto the Buffalo Rose...

Pretty cool building, hey? And there's something fitting about that red light. 😉 I'm pretty sure those ladies pictured in the windows up there symbolize what I think they're supposed to symbolize. This was a mining town after all.

So we walked out front and saw a big statue of a buffalo. This kid kept hopping around it as I took a pic. He'd jump behind it and make coughing (buffalo?) noises and then leap out after I took my photo. Turns out I wanted to keep the one he was in!

I took a few photos through the windows. I don't know if that kid playing around was what took down the spook factor, but I didn't feel much here. However, mom said she thought this room wasn't as empty as it looked.

We have a disagreement going, but I think that dark form in the back looks like a person sitting. He'd be sitting with one leg down and one crossed over it. Mom thinks it's a reflection of something. I did look up a picture of the pool room online and saw that there is seating in that area. So...

A little closer with the contrast bumped up:

Now, here's a building I felt something from! It's a theater now, but I'm not sure what it's original purpose was.

It's called the Miner's Alley Theater. There was something about this entire street.

I felt a strong presence walking down to that red neon sign and then around the corner to this place, The Ace-Hi Tavern.

This place has something shaking. I felt like someone was lounging against the wall of the doorway. I bumped up the contrast big time to see if I could find anything unusual. What do you think?

A little orby-orb up there?

I wrote an email to the owner of the Ace-Hi last night asking if he had any ghosts. I've never written an email like that before! I told him basically what I just told you, about what I felt walking by. To my pleasant surprise, he wrote me back later that evening! And what's more, he has ghost stories.

I'll just paste what he wrote here, because it's cool the way he said it:

Justine,
Thank you for sharing your experience with me.
Yes, we have had ghosts for many years. Never anything scary but have had customers and staff witness bottles, glasses a pitchers fly off the bar or shelves. I myself have been putting liquor bottles away in my back room and then turn to get more bottles to add and look on the shelf and see that the bottles have moved about 6 inches just in the time I turned my head. This happens on a regular basis. I hear them sliding against the shelf and have always been a little freaked out but never scared. It's a building that had been around since the late 1800s and has quite a colorful history. If your ever back in town you'll have to stop by!

As I responded to him, I love how we're living at a time when I can reach out and openly ask about the ghost I sensed and get a nice, honest answer like this! I hope to be in Golden again and if I am, I'll go in the Ace-Hi and say hello.

The street the Ace-Hi is on, just had a vibe in general.

It wasn't at all scary around here. When I say "vibe" I mean it felt inhabited, but not in any kind of bad way. You could just feel the history and a few old inhabitants. But you know how you get a sense of how dangerous a place is at night? This old downtown area felt totally safe.

I love this little building. It looks like it should be an ice cream parlor or a barber shop, but it appears to be a law office. I don't have any ghost stories to offer here, it's just a building I wanted to share. I like those glazed bricks a lot. There's a building around here made of those too and they give a neat reflection. I found a masonry web site that will tell you everything you'd want to know about the bricks: Masonry of Denver - Brick at the Quaintance Block

So, about what I said earlier about it being helpful to take lots of random photos... We got lost on the way back and had to trace my photos in reverse order like Hansel and Gretel to find our way around! This one with the neon liquor store sign saved the day because it had both a landmark and a street sign in it.

Yeah, this obviously took some detective work. Luckily, I can really close in on the pictures I've taken.

So I had to get a photo of the lifesaving neon sign on the way back. Plus, I like colorful neon. And it has the added bonus of including the words "Golden" and "Coors". I wonder how old that Coors sign is?

Have any of your traveled through Golden? If so, I'd love to compare notes! 👻